Chapter 3 - The Sound of Starving SilenceJamie
Chapter 3 - The Sound of Starving SilenceJamie ate with a mechanical, heartbreaking obedience—the kind of caution taught only to children who have learned that crying brings punishment and asking questions brings wrath. My chest seized with a physical agony far worse than any injury I had sustained in the desert. The mansion I had financed through five years of absolute isolation was not sheltering my family; it was encasing them like a tomb while my mother and sister used the main quarters as a playground for social elites.
Every dollar I sent—the $1,800 monthly remittance meant for groceries, healthcare, and stability—had been swallowed by Gertrude’s greed and Prudence’s endless vanity. They had systematically stripped Sarah of her dignity, reducing her to an invisible prisoner forced to scavenge for scraps in the very home I built for her.
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My mind raced through the lies Gertrude had whispered over the phone for half a decade. She’s at the salon. She’s out shopping. No, she was locked away in the filth, scrubbing floors while Gertrude wore diamond necklaces bought with my blood.
The weight of the realization threatened to crush my ribs. I had trusted blindly, assuming that shared blood equated to a shared conscience. I had been a fool, fighting demons in the sand while a far more wicked parasite feasted inside my own walls.
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